In my life this week…

Last weekend was the year end for Philip’s Irish Dance studio. They do it at the local community theatre. They always put on a good show and this year was no exception. Philip is at the advanced beginners level but they go up to championship levels. We have some that have competed at the national level and one at worlds.

I have gone four days without playing Candy Crush. I know it sounds silly but it was taking over. I used to read at night but I was playing Candy Crush instead. This week I just completely lost interest in it one day and decided to embrace and encourage that feeling

I’m Cleaning…

My wife finished off her dresser and side of the bed. It has made a huge difference. She got rid of another bag to donate, a full recycling bin and a bag of garbage. She commented the other day that it was nice to be able to find the book that she was reading.

I spent that day rearranging and purging three book shelves, one of which is now empty. I need to do some more down there before I am going to  be willing to get rid of any shelving. My plans keep changing. I did fill two boxes with books to donate and half a recycling bin.

This week I started tackling the craft room. It is going to take a couple of days and probably some input from my wife. We have a lot of raw material, too much probably. I have purged some but there is a lot more and it is all in bins. Basically I dealt with the stuff on the floor and desks. The boxes that are under the table are from the bathroom that is still missing its vanity. It arrived today complete with a forklift hole in one side. A new one is on order, arrival date unknown.

I did write a very long post talking about how I came to be on this minimalist journey and because they are somewhat intertwined my journey to being a SAHD and my wife’s debt freedom journey.

In our homeschool this week…

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! One week to go until my deadline for the kids and two weeks until I have to have the portfolios in. Philip has pulled himself out of the fire and is now relatively safe in the frying pan. I would like to see a little more detail in Margaret’s essay on Residential Schools. I also need to start preparing the portfolios and getting them online. Two more weeks until I can relax and run out the clock.

Ian describing how to make a capital ‘R’.
First you draw a line. Then you make it a ‘P’ and then you add a ‘K’.

Global Warming…

One of the concerns about global warming is sea level rise. There have been a number of studies over the years but the one that is currently accepted is the 2010 US National Research Council report. It takes in to account the expansion of the ocean water due to heating as well as the current projections for melt from Greenland and Antarctica. They have the sea level rise by 2100 as between 22 and 79 inches. That is about half a meter to two meters. There is a mapping tool that allows you to see want various sea level changes would look like. The effect of that would be pretty wide ranging so rather than try to list them I’m going to send you to Wikipedia.

A photo, video, link, or quote to share (silly, serious or both!)…

This video was on our local news and happened at a nearby university. These birds figured out how to trigger the sensor to open the door to were their nest was.

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In my life this week…

Friday night we had friends over for dinner. They have five daughters, two of which are close to Margaret in age and one is close to Ian in age. They had a great time playing together and started watching Frozen. Our guests had not yet seen it. Unfortunately they started it to late and were not able to finish that night. We ended up having the two that are close to Margaret’s age back on Saturday for a sleep over and they watched it twice. For the adults and the two older girls we stayed upstairs and talked. We also snuck dessert without telling the younger ones. It meant that we got to eat it in peace and quiet. At least until they caught on. It was a lot fun for both the kids and the adults and we need to do it more often.

The sleepover was likewise fun. They played outside for a bit and then we had supper. After supper they watched Frozen twice and dressed up like the characters with stuff out of our dress-up box. It the morning we fed them breakfast and took them to church. We attend the same church so that was the most convenient way to return them to their parents.

We named our Betta fish Beta Tester. That was my wife’s idea and it has stuck.

The kids had their first water fight of the year. My wife set a temperature that it had to be before they could so they have been carefully watching the thermometer. They had a lot of fun and turned the slide into a water slide. They also managed to not track in a muddy mess although Ian was wearing his shoes instead of crocs.

I’m Cleaning…

My wife worked on her dresser but that turned out to be at least a two day job. Unfortunately she has not had time for a second day at it. She is going to have another go at it tomorrow. Part of the problem is that some of the stuff that the kids and I have dealt with have ended up on her dresser. Basically anything that is her’s that we didn’t know where to put ended up there. It was already a disaster but we did add stuff to it. She made great progress and I can testify that the top was clean at one point. Then she started sorting the books from the floor.

I cleaned out the fridge and out upstairs freezer. The fridge was a disaster but that is really just part of living. The freezer was stuffed full and pulling stuff out was like playing Jenga. A lot of it was unidentifiable or freezer burned. I also really need to make banana bread. When ever there are bananas that are about to go bad we stick them in the freezer skin and all. It works great except I have 20+ frozen bananas and a double batch only calls for six.

People have been asking what has been motivating me to do this. The personal reasons will require its own post but the week to week stuff has come from a Babycenter board called “Becoming a Minimalist”. They have weekly challenges that I have been follow along with great advise and the occasionally tough love kick in the behind.

In our homeschool this week…

We are now two weeks from the kids’ deadline to get all their work done and three weeks from when I have to submit the portfolios. Margaret is still on track Philip I think has finally hit the point where the deadline is applying enough pressure to get results. He will get it done. He always does but he is giving me grey hairs in the process.

We also had the fun of opening a curriculum box. We had ordered Rightstart Math for Ian for next year and this huge box arrived.

The cool thing that we did was play with spectrums again under more controlled conditions. The pictures are taken in my laundry room as it is the only room that I can make totally dark. The first is a normal continuous spectrum that come from heating something until it glows. The second is a CFL light bulb. The lines could be used to tell what elements are in there being excited to glow.

I’m Cooking…

Margaret decided to get creative with the Kool-Aid. She carefully weighed the tiny 6g package and used the scale to divide two packets into 3g piles. She then mixes the flavors and stored one “packet” in a Ziploc bag and made up the other.

Global Warming…

One of the things that I think shows the effect that Global Warming is having is the Arctic. There is lots going on up their but the National Snow and Ice Data Center has been tracking the sea ice since 1979. The video shows the losses that we have seen. There is also a graphing page that lets you select various years and two sets of averages. It is interesting to compare the 1979-2000 average with the 1981 to 2010. The 2 standard deviation grey area expands greatly between the two. The yearly lines should be within the grey area 95% time. That is what 2 standard deviations mean. They should also be evenly distributed above and below the average. You have to go back quite a while to find one that is above.

A photo, video, link, or quote to share (silly, serious or both!)…

I think I saw this on someone’s blog but I can’t remember who’s. YouTube just suggested it as a “Watch this again” video. I really liked it the first time so I thought I would share it.

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In my life this week…

We started out our week with finally seeing Captain America: Winter Soldier in the theatre. We don’t see movies in the theatre very often. (2-3 times a year) We really wanted to see it before the season finale of Agents of Shield and I am very glad that we did. Ian was very well behaved which was normal in the theatre but this was his first in theatre PG-13 movie. He has watched a number of PG-13 movies on DVD in our house but I wasn’t sure how he would act in the theatre. He tends to jump up and down during the action scenes at home. Anyway if you haven’t already watched it is certainly worth it.

I’m Cleaning…

My wife tackled her closet. The improvement is amazing and I am very happy with the result. I can now get up in the night without tripping over something.

My task for this week was the container drawers and yes unfortunately that is plural. The good news is that I am down to one drawer and it is organized. If you are wondering about the triangle shaped containers they are for pie.

In our homeschool this week…

Margaret is almost done everything I need for her portfolio. She will be done by June. That gives me plenty of time to get it all organized. Philip on the other had is going to cut it close as usual. We will make it we always do.

Margaret finished her rough draft on the Native Residential Schools. Grandma will go over it with her on Friday so that next week she can work on a final draft. That and science is all she has left on the required list. June will be fun but educational stuff.

I’m Cooking…

Wednesday was the end of Catachism for the year and as usual they had a party. Also as usual I was asked to provide the dessert. They got brownies with ice cream and homemade chocolate sauce.

I’m Praying for…

All the people affected by the wildfires in California.

Global Warming…

I got a positive response from last weeks bit so I figured I would continue it for a while. I may split these out in to their own post, we will see.

Last week the video talked about drought. So this week I want to share a website that tracks the drought conditions across the US on a weekly basis. The image above is this week’s current image. They get updated every Thursday. There is also a an archive and a set of animations. You can also click on the map down to the State level. You can see just how dry California already is and this is really early in the year. The town talked about in the video is in the northern part of Texas and you can see they are still under drought.

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